Summary: God wants us to win at life and has made this possible through Jesus Christ.

You were made to win. You are destined to win. God has given you everything you need in Christ in order to excel, to succeed at life, and for all eternity.

This message is entitled “Destined to win”, and I hope that by the time we finish here today that God gives you a new vision for your life, a new passion to serve Him with all your being, and a grateful acceptance of all the potential that exists in you because you belong to Jesus Christ.

If you have not yet received Jesus Christ as your Lord and Saviour, my prayer is that today God will move in your heart and perform the miracle of giving you saving faith today;

so that you can know that you know that you know that your life is both safe in God’s hands, and so you know that you are here for a purpose far bigger than yourself, a purpose that God intends to engage your whole life with.

I’ve spent the last 3 weeks serving as a chaplain at the Pan Am games, in the Multi-Faith Centre at the Athletes Village at the foot of Bayview avenue.

So I’ve been spending a lot of time both with athletes who are pushing themselves in many cases to the limits of human endurance, and with an awesome team of chaplains from the Americas, most of whom, unlike me when I started, have a significant amount of ministry experience working closely with athletes.

What do chaplains do? They help to lead Athletes to Jesus and to motivate those who already belong to Him to give Jesus their absolute best, to be mindful that their whole lives are an act of worship and adoration, and that in their sport they can feel God’s deep pleasure as they give their everything.

So as chaplains we’ve been working together to encourage athletes - many of whom come from poor neighbourhoods in poor cities in poor countries.

These athletes bear the weight of the hopes of their families, friends and countries, and they are here to find out how they rank in the world of athletes.

They are the best of the best in their cities. And they’ve come here to find out where exactly they stand on the globe.

Many of the Pan Am sports are qualifiers for the Olympics next year in Rio De Janeiro. Barb and I hope to join the chaplaincy team over there next year to, again, serve the athletes as they push to discover their abilities and their ranking in the world.

And as I’ve served at the games, some Scriptures have come to have new meaning to me, and I hope they will have an impact on you as you consider what God is saying to your heart today.

In 1st Timothy, Paul is writing to a young disciple of his who has been serving as a leader in his church. Timothy has not been at it for too long, and he’s had some troubles.

He’s been misunderstood, and he’s been underappreciated for what he is: a strong young leader in Ephesus, where Paul had planted one of the first churches. [I’m glad we don’t take for granted the young leaders we have in our congregation.